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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26763709">Breaking Point</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Slyboots/pseuds/Slyboots'>Slyboots</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Transformers: Prime</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Bad Puns, Dark Comedy, Ficlet Collection, Horror, M/M, Ocean, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Torture, Whump, thalassophobia</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 02:49:30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,131</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26763709</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Slyboots/pseuds/Slyboots</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>"'Beginner’s mistake, Screamer.' Knock Out’s heels click, drawing closer. 'Breakdown never breaks down. Mentally. Obviously physically—'"</p><p>31 days of Breakdown breaking down, mentally and physically. Written for Whumptober 2020.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Breakdown/Knock Out</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Whumptober 2020</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Structural Fault | Hanging</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Prompt: "Let's Hang Out Sometime (Waking Up Restrained | Shackled | Hanging)"</p><p>Breakdown hangs in there.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p></p><div class="message-2qnXI6 cozyMessage-3V1Y8y groupStart-23k01U wrapper-2a6GCs cozy-3raOZG zalgo-jN1Ica">
  <p></p>
  <div class="contents-2mQqc9">
    <p></p>
    <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
      <p>“—structural weak points,” says Knock Out, his voice a distant hum. He is a bright photo negative on Breakdown’s HUD, his faceplate ghostly. “D’you know what that does to a joint?”</p>
    </div>
    <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
      <p>“In sickening detail.” Starscream looks about to purge. “Soundwave—cut this from the log.”</p>
    </div>
    <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
      <p>A rivet tears, with a dry squeak; the dull stitch in his shoulder releases, like a bubble popping. Breakdown bites off a roar. He hangs in strappado, arms wrenched back behind his shoulders. His own weight chokes him. Thinner metal would’ve torn, slicing an Energon line—but Breakdown’s made of sterner stuff.</p>
    </div>
    <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
      <p>The next rivet’s burning now. By his audial he hears the faint squeak of metal wearing down.</p>
    </div>
  </div>
  <div class="buttonContainer-DHceWr">
    <p></p>
    <div class="buttons-cl5qTG container-3npvBV isHeader-2dII4U">
      <p></p>
      <div class="wrapper-2aW0bm">
        <p></p>
        <div class="button-1ZiXG9">
          <p>“One down,” he slurs, when he can speak again. Sizzling air leaks through the sheared rivet, condensing on his hot faceplate. He tastes himself: melting grease, leaking transmission fluid, scorching rubber.</p>
        </div>
      </div>
    </div>
  </div>
</div><div class="message-2qnXI6 cozyMessage-3V1Y8y wrapper-2a6GCs cozy-3raOZG zalgo-jN1Ica">
  <p></p>
  <div class="contents-2mQqc9">
    <p></p>
    <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
      <p>Starscream paces; he is more shape and shadow, his silhouette uncertain, than solid mech. Breakdown’s HUD goes for an instant monochrome, and Starscream’s image doubles and distorts.</p>
    </div>
  </div>
</div><div class="message-2qnXI6 cozyMessage-3V1Y8y wrapper-2a6GCs cozy-3raOZG zalgo-jN1Ica">
  <p></p>
  <div class="contents-2mQqc9">
    <p></p>
    <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
      <p>“Seven to go.” An effort to speak, with gravity a yoke crushing his synth.</p>
    </div>
    <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
      <p></p>
      <div class="message-2qnXI6 cozyMessage-3V1Y8y groupStart-23k01U wrapper-2a6GCs cozy-3raOZG zalgo-jN1Ica">
        <p></p>
        <div class="contents-2mQqc9">
          <p></p>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>“Whatever you say, Starscream. I’ll confess.” Knock Out’s optics swim, black holes in his white faceplate. “I personally led the plot to offline Lord Megatron. Sowed dissent, fomented dissension, roused the rabble. All <em>moi</em>. D’you want a signed affidavit?”</p>
          </div>
        </div>
      </div>
      <div class="message-2qnXI6 cozyMessage-3V1Y8y wrapper-2a6GCs cozy-3raOZG zalgo-jN1Ica">
        <p></p>
        <div class="contents-2mQqc9">
          <p></p>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>“Knock Out,” says Breakdown thickly.</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>“Mute it. Save your strength. And for Primus’s sake don’t move.” Knock Out’s a smear of red in the dark. “You’ll pull something.”</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>He snorts, despite himself, and regrets it. The chains squeak, slipping into a tender seam between wrist and hand. His hand goes numb—but Energon trickles down his forearm, puddling amid blazing wires.</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>The floor is a meter down. Less. It might as well be the void of space below him. Breakdown kicks, clumsily, at nothing; the chains draw tighter, with a decisive snick, and he howls.</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>“Gonna leave me hanging, Starscream?” he slurs, and he pitches forward into darkness—</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p> </p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>—and he’s lying back. His mouth tastes of frothy purge; there is a yawning lightness by his side.</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>His processor is congealed. <em>Knock Out</em>, he tries; it dissipates on the way to his voicebox.</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>“—going to be a little kink in our working relationship, Starscream.”</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p><em>Knock Out.</em> He tries again to speak. Gurgles. His intake line is choked with purge and lubricant; he spits, and it oozes down his chin, and mingles with condensate and drying Energon. Something is missing. He feels, vaguely, he should know what; that unsettles him, as if the berth might at any second give way, hurtling him back into the abyss.</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>Knock Out’s shadow jitters on the ceiling. “You’ve got enough scuttlebutt to scuttle my reputation. <em>And</em> some of it’s true.”</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>“Perish the thought,” mutters Starscream, in a watery rasp. “If Breakdown had confessed—“</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>At his name he tries again. It comes out a baffled bark of static.</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>“Beginner’s mistake, Screamer.” Knock Out’s heels click, drawing closer. “Breakdown never breaks down. Mentally. Obviously <em>physically</em>—“</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>“I had no choice!” Starscream’s fans whistle, from not so very far away. Shadows twitch on the medbay’s ceiling; something smells of burnt rubber and wet copper. “Soundwave would have—“</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>“Accused you of personally tugging the plug on Big M? Devil of a scapegoat you chose. Breakdown’s the picture of integrity.” Breakdown’s vision blurs again. Knock Out’s haloed in red and gold, his faceplate washed out.</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>
              <em>Didn’t break. Didn’t let you down.</em>
            </p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>He reaches for Knock Out—</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>—with a hand he cannot feel. This baffles him, for a bleak instant. Sparks crackle, splitting the air. His shoulder is a nest of wires. He looks, head lolling to the side, and does not see.</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>"You’re mostly armless,” says Knock Out, with a tight repressive smile. “Try not to scream.”</p>
          </div>
          <div class="markup-2BOw-j messageContent-2qWWxC">
            <p>“Ow,” mumbles Breakdown, and at the smell of current fizzing over mangled wire, he blacks out again.</p>
          </div>
        </div>
      </div>
    </div>
  </div>
</div>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Pressure At Sea Level | Water</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Breakdown doesn't look before he leaps.</p>
<p>Prompt: "Alt 12: Water."</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Through the tectonic groans of steel giving way, the hiss of the storm, he hears Knock Out bark: “Is </span>
  <em>
    <span>anyone</span>
  </em>
  <span> receiving us up there?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Knock Out’s alive, then. Breakdown rallies. “Hey, Bulkhead. You give?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The world teeters. Beneath their feet, the oil rig bucks and jumps, as if goosed, and saltwater lashes them from a thousand directions. Through the fog and the bitter glare he spots Bulkhead, a shadow against the uncanny sky; he’s running for it, the artifact abandoned.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“You give?” bellows Breakdown. His laugh’s deranged in his own audials. “Fun’s just getting started.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>For a klik he was rattled, when Knock Out’s lights went dead. For a moment the world went still and quiet--</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The crest of fear breaks over him, the tension releasing. His laugh’s almost a scream. The next wave hits, spewing foam across the deck; he loses track of Bulkhead, loses everything but Knock Out’s yell of “</span>
  <em>
    <span>Soundwave</span>
  </em>
  <span>, any millennium now--”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Breakdown hits the deck before he realizes he’s been swept off his feet. He tastes rust and salt and Energon--and fraying nerves, too. He pulls himself upright, against the scouring wind, and goes down. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The world’s a black rattle. He’s tossed limp against iron walkways; beneath his weight a cable snaps. Still he’s laughing, beyond words now, though it’s almost lost in the roar of the rain on his armor.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The little one helps him up, steadies him against the wall. Bumblebee, he remembers--but he’s taken a few hits to the processor. Could be Cliffjumper.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The kid’s optics are sincere; Breakdown </span>
  <em>
    <span>feels</span>
  </em>
  <span> his mangled speech, the current pulsing over his damp armor: </span>
  <em>
    <span>We’re bridging out. If you stay here, you will die.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Breakdown almost laughs at that, too.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The Autobots’ ground bridge opens; at once the rain flushes away the burnt-silicon taste on the air. The glow’s blinding, illuminating the deck, the foul sea below. Against indigo clouds something’s circling, swooping low, and Breakdown’s mind has no room for it--</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Somewhere in the tarry darkness, Knock Out’s repeating all the comms frequencies he knows, into dead air. With a hydraulic hiss Breakdown grabs the kid, slams him by the throat against a buckling pylon. “Knock Out,” he roars, “got you a ticket out.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>You will die</span>
  </em>
  <span>--</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>White noise in his mind. His processor won’t hold it.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>You will die--</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>And Knock Out charges past him, slip-stumbling, the artifact aglow beneath his arm. A wave hits, spraying salt and sea between them, and Breakdown’s HUD blazes with alerts. For dear life he pins the kid against the pylon, both of them gasping blind into the dark. A strange intimacy, their bodies crushed together as the rig bucks beneath them. For a klik there is nothing but the bellow of the ocean, the iceberg-blue of Bumblebee’s optics, the nervy lusty tingle where fear meets rage meets swooping joy--</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Knock Out’s signal gutters. He’s through.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Breakdown hurls the kid after him. “Thanks.” It’s almost inaudible over the waves. The cables snap, faster and faster. Breakdown’s in no hurry. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>You will die--</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He glances back up, at the encroaching sky, and recognizes--</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Starscream.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Little bird didn’t quite fly the nest. </span>
  </em>
  <span>Soundwave’s stranded them all, and Starscream’s been circling, circling--</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>For an instant Breakdown thinks nothing at all. His mind will not process it.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Starscream’s circling, looking for somewhere to land. Breakdown imagines, dully, his terror--</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>--and the wind turns, and Starscream’s pitched out of the sky.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The rig vibrates; the entire ocean might be roiling beneath them. Starscream hurtles into the dark, transforming as he falls. The ocean leaps up to seize him, and the waves suck him down.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>There is all the time in the world to make a decision.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It feels inevitable, as if his body acts on some kernel instinct. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Knock Out’s gonna make it</span>
  </em>
  <span>, thinks Breakdown, and he saunters almost calmly to the edge of the rig. He thinks nothing at all, and surrenders to gravity.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>And then he’s </span>
  <em>
    <span>thrashing</span>
  </em>
  <span>, the sea closing around him like a black fist. Saltwater floods, choking, into his vents; too late he slams them shut, expelling what he can, but the damage alerts are blooming already on his HUD. Breakdown kicks out at nothing, clawing toward nothing--</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It occurs to him that this is real, and that he might die.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The ocean closes over his head. The world goes quiet and murky, as if through tinted glass.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Get to Starscream</span>
  </em>
  <span>. It rings in his mind. This, too, does not feel like a choice.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The water’s stronger than Breakdown is. It slams him back, his head breaching the surface, and smashes him against a pylon--</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>--and as it sucks him back down, water gushing through his seams, he thinks vaguely of little Bumblebee--</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Down. And down again.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He waits for an instinct. None comes. Nothing in Breakdown’s coding prepares him for this. The sea buffets him, slapping at his faceplate, flooding bitter and choking down his intake (he closes his mouth, too late).</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>You will die--</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Breakdown chokes. Spits out the water, though it’s burning in his fuel tanks.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Get to Starscream.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He breaches again, in a splatter of foam, spewing lubricant and saltwater from his intake. Against the sky and sea the rig’s pitiful. Breakdown feels </span>
  <em>
    <span>small</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It occurs to him dimly that Starscream may already be dead.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>He is tiny; he is helpless.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The sea is a void, dark and indifferent as interstellar space. This thought comforts him, as he sinks again.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Get to Starscream.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He knows space, intimately. Breakdown lets himself fall.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>There is nothing but darkness, and the steadily growing pressure alerts pinging his HUD, all the way down. He has long processing cycles to think--</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>--of Knock Out’s face, white and terrified--</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>--of decompression accidents, of the weak seams in his armor--</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>--but he tries not to. Something brushes his leg, and he kicks, in a whirl of hot panic. His indicators flicker on.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Breakdown stares at the void. Ribbons of Energon, spiraling away into nothingness, flow from the burning cuts in his armor. He’s corroding from the inside by now, surely.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Get to Starscream.</span>
  </em>
  <span> It pulses in his mind. The rest he pushes out. His pressure alert blinks, unhurriedly.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>It is cold, he thinks, or warm. His temperature sensors are getting unreliable. Knock Out will fix that--</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>He wonders how long it takes for a car to rust away to nothing.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He hates water, he thinks, abstractly.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Starscream. Came here for Starscream.</span>
  </em>
  
</p>
<p>
  <span>The craggy seafloor rises up to meet him. A shoal of fish flicker round him, like Scraplets waiting to strip him clean. Things he cannot name, with bulging eyes luminous in his low-beams, regard him.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Starscream</span>
  </em>
  <span>, he thinks. It hammers the inside of his brainpan; he thinks he may burst from the pressure (</span>
  <em>
    <span>the pressure</span>
  </em>
  <span>).</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Starscream</span>
  </em>
  <span>. His signal is transmitting, scarcely audible over the pink noise flooding Breakdown’s comms.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Breakdown tastes corroding metal and salt. He moves as if through molten glass, across an alien landscape, and he does not think much after that.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Starscream is bleeding, swirling clouds of Energon drifting off him and dissipating in the mud. His optics are vacantly crossed. One arm hangs limp, the joint shredded perhaps by the fall.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Breakdown scoops him up. There is no question of leaving him. Starscream is light; the world is heavy. Better not to think how many tons of water are above them--</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>The ocean </span>
  <em>
    <span>swallows</span>
  </em>
  <span> hunks of metal. This far down, the oil rig’s pylons are rust-eaten, scarcely recognizable. Time has worn great channels into the steel. Organic life, dull corals and dead-eyed fishes, blooms round the pylons’ bases. Breakdown has a brief dark vision: his own body, rivets long buckled, overrun by fat sea-worms and pulled apart by chitinous things--</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Best not to think of anything at all.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It’s a long walk to shore, with water seeping between his rivets and burning at his seams. Starscream whimpers and kicks in his arms.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He cannot swim, but he can walk until he buckles like a popped rivet. Breakdown puts one foot in front of the other, kicking up silty mud, as his HUD alerts float in the dark.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>A joor ago he was laughing--</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>It is daylight. Breakdown’s wires are searing-hot. He lies, starkly mindless, in the weak sun. Beside him Starscream twitches, spewing water onto the sand.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>A car’s engine purrs, and then running footsteps--</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Where have you </span>
  <em>
    <span>been</span>
  </em>
  <span>?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It’s a silly question. Knock Out knows where he’s been. He tries to answer, but his synth is waterlogged.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Oh, Primus, you’re corroded like a cheap battery.” Knock Out’s voice is rich with disgust. He kneels in the sand, Flips Breakdown over with a little grunt. “You’re going to </span>
  <em>
    <span>kill</span>
  </em>
  <span> me worrying. Or give me stress cracks.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The sun is warm and clean. The sand clings to Breakdown’s damp armor.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Breakdown. D’you ever </span>
  <em>
    <span>think</span>
  </em>
  <span> someone is going to have to clean you up?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>No. No, he rarely thinks at all.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
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